Day in Photos: Aug. 17, 2012

Horses crash on the first curve of the dirt-covered course in Siena’s main square during the Madonna dell’Assunta ancient Palio horse race in Tuscany, central Italy. One of the horses broke a front leg in the crash. Animal rights campaigners are calling for an end to the famed Palio after six of ten horses crashed during the latest edition. Critics have long held the race, a fierce competition between the Tuscan city’s quarters, should be held without animals. Horses frequently fall, collide, or are trampled during the race, and some 50 have died since 1970..

AP Photo

People attempt to climb greased and slippery poles, to which prizes and flags are attached, to celebrate Indonesia’s Independence Day in Jakarta. Indonesia marked the 67th anniversary of its freedom from Dutch rule.

AFP/Getty Images

Indian Muslims offer prayers on the last Friday of Ramadan outside the Bandra railway station in Mumbai. Muslims around the world are preparing to celebrate the Eid al-Fitr holiday, which marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.

AFP/Getty Images

embers of the all-girl punk band “Pussy Riot” Yekaterina Samutsevich (L), Maria Alyokhina (C) and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova (R) sit in a glass-walled cage during a court hearing in Moscow. A Moscow court handed a two years jail sentence on the three women from a tiny punk band who captured global attention by defying the Russian authorities and ridiculing President Vladimir Putin in a church. Pussy Riot release rallies have stretched from Sydney to New York as a growing list of celebrities joined ex-Beatle Paul McCartney and pop icon Madonna in a campaign directed against Putin’s crackdown on most dissent.

AFP/Getty Images

Members of the judicial police participate in the Gabon national day parade in Libreville. Clashes broke out in Libreville when police broke up an unauthorized protest in support of the country’s main opposition leader.

AFP/Getty Images

A member of Indonesian Air Force lies on the ground after she fainted during a ceremony commemorating the country’s independence day at Merdeka Palace in Jakarta, Indonesia.

AP Photo

Yuto Ono, 3, sitting on his father’s shoulders enjoy a walk through a field of sunflowers at a park in Zama, west of Tokyo.

AP Photo

People inspect the aftermath of an overnight car bomb attack in Baghdad’s Shiite enclave of Sadr City, Iraq.

AP Photo

A Nepalese Hindu man holds a candle while he gets ready to perform a ritual during Kuse Aunsi or Nepalese Father’s day at Gokarneshwar temple in Katmandu, Nepa. Kuse Aunsi is a unique Hindu festival of Nepal where fathers living or dead are honored. Children with living fathers show their appreciation by giving presents and sweets and those whose fathers are deceased pay tributes at Gokarneshwar temple.

AP Photo

A masked man attends a rally, in support of Russian punk band Pussy Riot, in Sydney, a Moscow court handed a two years jail sentence on the three women from a tiny punk band who captured global attention by defying the Russian authorities and ridiculing President Vladimir Putin in a church.

REUTERS

U.S. Forest Service firefighters work on the Springs Fire in Boise National Forest near Banks-Garden Valley, Idaho.

REUTERS

A young man jumps from a pedalo into the water of Lake Leman as he and his friends enjoy a hot summer day in Lausanne, Switzerland.

REUTERS

Lama Buddhist monks unveiled a giant religious painting of Sakyamuni Buddha, while pilgrims and tourists watch, during the unfolding of the giant Buddha portrait event at Sho Dun Festival at Drepung monastery in Lhasa city, Tibet.

EPA

A firefighting tanker plane drops water above a forest fire near Lacanau, near Bordeaux, France.

REUTERS

Juli Kisan plays with Buddu, a one and a half-year-old sloth bear at the family’s home in Lakhapada, India.

AP Photo

Francesco Matrone leaves the police headquarters of Salerno, southern Italy, after his arrest. More than 100 agents and a helicopter participated in the arrest of Francesco Matrone, known as “The Beast’ in a dwelling near Salerno. Convicted in a double homicide and sentenced to two life terms, Matrone has been on the run since 2007. He was on the Interior Ministry’s list of top nine fugitives.

AP Photo

Thai nursing students practicing dancing to music as part of the “Smiling and Happiness for the Patient” project at the Royal Thai Air Force Nursing College in Bangkok, Thailand.

EPA

A huge fire engulfs a bar in Phuket. Four people died and at least 11 were injured in a fire early on Friday at the Tiger Pub on Patong beach, Phuket Island, Thailand.

REUTERS

Visitors watch “kingyo”, or goldfish, swimming in a polyhedral aquarium on the opening day of the Art Aquarium Exhibition in Tokyo.

AP Photo

Visitors explore Colourscape on the front lawn of Holburne Museum in Bath, England. Billed as the museum’s summer event, the Colourscape Music Festival is a labyrinth of inflatable interconnected chambers flooded with colored light which forms a walk-in sculpture of color, light and sound.

Getty Images

Brazilian Adriano De Souza in action to win his round one heat at the Billabong Pro in Teahupoo, Tahiti.

AFP/Getty Images

A member of the Roman Legion XIV group marches towards Nowa Slupia, south-east of Poland,. Roman Legion XIV reenactors will take part in the 46th Dymarki Swietokrzyskie, the largest archaeological picnic in Poland.

EPA

Indian snake charmers show their skills during a snake festival in the city of Bishnupur, north west of Kolkata. The festival is organized as a part of special worship to the Hindu mythology goddess Manasha, the god of snakes.

AFP/Getty Images

Miss Panama, Maricely del Carmen Gonzalez Pomares stretches the wings of her costume during a rehearsal for the finals of the Miss World beauty pageant at Dongsheng Stadium in Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China.

EPA

An activist of the Ukrainian feminist group Femen raises a chainsaw after cutting down a cross, erected to the memory of victims of the political repression in Kiev. The protest was in support of Russian punk band Pussy Riot, who captured global attention by defying the Russian authorities and ridiculing President Vladimir Putin in a church.